The
righteous theme of the Exodus video is that a historical religion ought to
yield historically identifiable evidence. And it does
-- Deo gratia!E. Fox]

Amazing discovery in heart of
biblical Jerusalem

By: DAVID HAZONY
Special to the CJN

In what many archaeologists hail as the
potential find of the century, remains of a massive structure dating to
the time of King David have been discovered in the heart of biblical
Jerusalem.

Eilat Mazar, the Israeli archaeologist leading
the excavation, has suggested that it may, in fact, be the palace built by
David as described in the Bible.

The discovery has shaken the already
contentious field of biblical archaeology to its roots: For the last few
years, a number of respected archaeologists n most prominently Israel
Finkelstein, chairman of Tel Aviv University’s archaeology department and
author of the 2001 best-seller The Bible Unearthed n have argued that the
biblical accounts of Jerusalem as the seat of a great and united monarchy
under the rule of David and Solomon are false. If Mazar’s hypothesis
proves right, it would go a long way toward proving Finkelstein and the
others wrong.

Her findings will also doubtlessly affect the
broader political battle over Jerusalem n that is, the question of whether
the Jewish people has its origins in the city and thus has a special hold
over it, or whether the concept of a Jewish origin in Jerusalem is nothing
but a myth.

With such a potentially powerful find, there
will naturally be no shortage of skeptics, whether for reasons of politics
or scholarship. Yet there are many good reasons to identify Mazar’s find,
at least provisionally, as the palace described in the Book of Samuel.
These reasons deserve to be heard.

According to archaeological evidence,
Jerusalem was founded two millennia before David arrived on the scene in
1000 B.C.E. Because of its unique topography n a high hill nestled between
two deep valleys that converge at its southern point, graced with abundant
sources of water and exposed to attack only along a ridge from the north n
the location proved ideal for the capital of a kingdom.

Therefore, David did not destroy the city when
he conquered it from the Jebusites, but rather added to it. The most
notable addition was the palace built by the Phoenician king, Hiram of
Tyre, as a gesture of friendship.

Based on the biblical account, coupled with
textual clues as to the topography and findings previously published by
Kathleen Kenyon, Mazar formulated her proposal as to the location of the
palace in a 1997 article in Biblical Archaeology Review.

“If some regard as too speculative the
hypothesis I shall put forth in this article,” she wrote, “my reply is
simply this: Let us put it to the test in the way archaeologists always
try to test their theories n by excavation.” In early 2005, with the
support of the Jerusalem-based Shalem Center, the City of David
Foundation, and Hebrew University, Mazar did just that.

The evidence she found is remarkable: A
section of a massive wall, which runs about 100 feet from west to east
before making a right-angle turn heading south, implies the existence of a
very large building. Other findings include pottery shards, discovered in
the dirt fill between the stones of the wall, which were dated to the 11th
century B.C.E., the earliest possible date of the building’s construction.

Additionally, the building is positioned
directly on bedrock along the city’s northern edge with no archaeological
layers beneath it. This implies that the structure, built two millennia
after the city’s founding, constituted a new, northward expansion of the
city’s limits, as described in the biblical account. It is located at what
was then the very summit of the mountain n a reasonable place for the
palace from which David is said, in II Samuel (5:17), to have “descended.”

Finally, Mazar discovered a remarkable clay
bulla, or signet impression, bearing the name of Yehuchal Ben Shelemiah, a
Judean prince from the time of King Zedekiah mentioned by name in Jeremiah
37:3. This evidence suggests that four centuries after David, the site was
still an important seat of Judean royalty. This matches the biblical
account of the palace being in continuous use from its construction until
the destruction of Judea by the Babylonians in 586 B.C.E.

The evidence seems to agree surprisingly well
with Mazar’s claim that this could be David’s palace. The location, size,
style, and dating of the building all match the textual description.
Moreover, there are no finds that suggest the contrary, such as the
idolatrous statuettes or ritual crematoria found in contemporary
Phoenician settlements. Furthermore, the building appears in an ancient
world where such constructions were extremely rare and represented the
greatest sort of public works. Finally, the evidence fits well with
previous archaeological finds from the site.

Naturally, many archaeologists, having been
trained in a scholarly world wary of religious enthusiasts, will be
extremely reluctant to identify any new archaeological find with
particulars found in the Bible. Others, driven by a combination of
interests, ideologies, or political agendas, will seize on any shred of
uncertainty in the building’s identification to distract attention from
the momentousness of the find. Both groups will invoke professionalism and
objectivity to undermine the proposition that this was David’s palace:
They will either raise the bar of required proofs to a standard that no
archaeological find could ever meet, or they will simply dismiss it all as
wishful thinking in the service of religious or Zionist motives.

Yet even if this is not in fact David’s
palace, there is no doubt that we are talking about an archaeological find
of revolutionary proportions. It is still the first discovery of a major
construction from the early Israelite period in Jerusalem.

No longer is it reasonable to claim, as many
revisionist archaeologists have done, that the absence of evidence from
the relevant period shows that the great unified monarchy of David and
Solomon was really an imaginary historiosophic creation. It is thus
significant that the normally reserved Amihai Mazar, cousin of Malat Mazar
and one of the most esteemed scholars in the field of biblical archaeology
and author of the standard textbook Archaeology of the Land of the Bible,
10,000 - 586 B.C.E., has described the discovery as “something of a
miracle.”

Furthermore, so long as we are willing to
admit that possible future evidence may prompt a different conclusion,
there is no reason not to identify this building as David’s palace. Put
simply, we have before us two things: A biblical text describing in detail
the creation of a Phoenician-style palace by David on a particular
mountain around the end of the eleventh or beginning of the tenth century
B.C.E.; and a grand Phoenician style structure dating from the same time
on the summit of that very mountain, located with assistance from the text
and previous archaeological discoveries.

Is this absolute proof? No. But surely it is
enough to shift the burden of proof. For in the end, the theory that this
is David’s palace is thus far the best explanation for the data. As Mazar
herself says, “Anyone who wants to say otherwise ought to come up with a
better theory.”

This is neither wishful thinking nor an
imagined past. It’s good science.

David Hazony is editor-in-chief of Azure (http://www.azure.org.il).
A longer version of this piece appears in the journal’s autumn 2005 issue.